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Iringa fire, 7 July 2019 Iringa, Chunya, Manyoni

Out · last detection 2 Aug 2019, 23:47 UTC

The fire started on 7 July 2019 in Iringa, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 26 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 97,386 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 4th largest in Iringa since 2016 (of 71 with a page). The largest in Tanzania in 2019, of 123.

Burnt area
97,386ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
26days
7 Jul 2019 – 1 Aug 2019
Municipalities hit
3
districts
Started on
7 Jul
2019
Heat detections
3,582
in a single hotspot: 267 MW
Danger at start
30
High · FWI index
Energy released
31.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

2 Aug 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Jul1 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

7891011121314151617181920212223242526272829303112

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

30°high
39km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 48 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

72% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 56,793 ha in 2016, 12,704 ha in 2017, 50,232 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 70,051 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Iringa where it started
    85,115 ha reached on 6 Jul
    4.5 %
  2. Chunya
    8,683 ha reached on 12 Jul
    0.5 %
  3. Manyoni
    4,194 ha reached on 7 Jul
    0.1 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

The weather day by day

ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
7 Jul 27.7 °C 38 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
8 Jul 28.3 °C 36 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
9 Jul 28.3 °C 36 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
10 Jul 28.9 °C 31 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
11 Jul 27.9 °C 32 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
12 Jul 27.5 °C 34 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
13 Jul 27.7 °C 36 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
14 Jul 27.3 °C 34 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
15 Jul 26.4 °C 30 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
16 Jul 26.7 °C 28 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
17 Jul 26.2 °C 33 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
18 Jul 25.3 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
19 Jul 27.3 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Jul 28.4 °C 33 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
21 Jul 30.1 °C 24 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
22 Jul 26.7 °C 26 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
23 Jul 26.5 °C 26 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
24 Jul 29.0 °C 24 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
25 Jul 30.3 °C 17 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
26 Jul 27.1 °C 25 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
27 Jul 26.4 °C 28 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
28 Jul 25.3 °C 30 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
29 Jul 28.0 °C 29 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
30 Jul 27.4 °C 33 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
31 Jul 26.5 °C 40 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
1 Aug 28.2 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
2 Aug after 27.6 °C 38 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
3 Aug after 28.6 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
4 Aug after 29.1 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
5 Aug after 29.9 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
6 Aug after 30.1 °C 23 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
7 Aug after 29.9 °C 26 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
8 Aug after 29.2 °C 31 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
9 Aug after 28.5 °C 31 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
10 Aug after 28.2 °C 25 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
11 Aug after 28.2 °C 25 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 38

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 30 Jun 2019
After · 8 Aug 2019

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 3,582Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
Date and timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Tanzania ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Iringa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 July 2019 and 1 August 2019: 26 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 97,386 hectares (973.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Iringa (85,115 ha, 4.5 %); Chunya (8,683 ha, 0.5 %); Manyoni (4,194 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.3 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 39 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Tanzania (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

Where to verify it

A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.

Emergency number: 112

Satellite cross-check

Does something look wrong on this page?

This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.

Report an error
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

Where this data comes from

The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.